


Remembrance: A Love Story In Fractures

by stag_von_simp



Category: Fire Emblem: Fuuin no Tsurugi | Fire Emblem: Binding Blade, Fire Emblem: Rekka no Ken | Fire Emblem: Blazing Sword
Genre: (kinda), Ambiguous/Open Ending, Angst, Bisexuality, Canon Timeline, Confusion, Erik Is Mentioned, Eventual Romance, F/M, Fluff, Fluff & Angst, Friends to Lovers, Gen, Kissing, M/M, Minor Character Death, Ninian Is Mentioned, Pining, Polyamory, Post-Game, Self-Esteem Issues, Vague Mentions of Blood, Written For a Tumblr Friend, pre-game
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-01
Updated: 2020-05-01
Packaged: 2021-03-01 16:55:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 10,916
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23950420
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/stag_von_simp/pseuds/stag_von_simp
Summary: Twice Eliwood saves Hector, twice Hector returns the favor, and one time they doom each other.(And Hector falls in love every. Single. Time....Even when he'd rather not.)
Relationships: Eliwood & Hector (Fire Emblem), Eliwood/Hector (Fire Emblem), Eliwood/Ninian (Fire Emblem), Hector/Lyndis (Fire Emblem)
Comments: 13
Kudos: 42





	1. one

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Kya4073](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kya4073/gifts).



“Oh, Hector, you’re an idiot.”

Eliwood is mopping tenderly at a slash dribbling blood down Hector’s torso. Hector’s focus is ready to shatter, since there’s so much to focus on; not only is he straining not to yelp against the burn of pain boiling from his wounds, but he has to wrestle back the urge to shriek, too, because Eliwood is poring over him, swiping at that cut with his nose only inches away from Hector’s stomach, ridged by a mountain range of muscle.

He wonders what Eliwood is thinking.

“Gods, Hector, I can’t stop all this bleeding myself,” Eliwood says, and it’s unnerving, to see him admitting defeat. “Is a healer in order? Because I can get one, if that’s what you need.”

His eyes are huge, brewing with worry and a thousand other unspoken fragments of emotion. It’s dizzying, to chase all that around in circles, circles, circles--

Though he may also be dizzy from blood loss.

Hector groans, arching onto his back, every bit of him clenched against the pain blurring through his chest.

“Hector, j-just say the word, and I’ll--”

“No way,” Hector rasps. “You’re not getting me a damned healer.”

“And why not? It’s clear that you need one.”

“Eliwood, can you stop being practical for a second? Think of my  _ pride _ here.”

And Eliwood has the decency to gasp, as if Hector’s pride has ever  _ not _ been the peak of his priorities. “You’re injured, Hector.”

“Yeah, and it’s because of that stupid Erik who won’t get off your back,” Hector reminds him, and Eliwood’s face wilts. He resumes to laboring over Hector’s wounds, ducking his head. “If I send for a healer, then I’m handing him victory. I can’t do that. I’d rather bleed out than do that, Eliwood. Besides, I won’t die until I’ve killed him first.”

“Why?”

“Justice. It’s my sworn duty. You never shut up about your duties; well, this is mine. To punch that grin right off his stupid face.” He’s so impassioned by his little speech, he’s squirming to sit up again. “I’ll do it right now. At least  _ then  _ I can die in peace.” Eliwood scrambles for a grip on Hector’s wrists, but it’s barely a hindrance.

What hinders Hector is the burst of dizziness that splatters his vision. That, actually, knocks him flat, and has Eliwood frantic. He pounces back onto Hector, setting right back to work on swabbing at the wound. Hector eases onto his elbows, gritting back a moan.

“You’re not going to die. Not this time. Well, probably not,” Eliwood says. “But a healer could still be of use. I’ll be happy to fetch one, if you’ll only swallow your pride.”

“No. Never. Just patch me up yourself.”

Eliwood’s eyes shoot up to his, incredulous. “I barely know how!”

“It can’t be that hard,” Hector reasons. “Besides, you’ve always been so great with your hands. Just give it a try.”

“I don’t want to somehow fumble and make your pain worse. It’s...It’s my fault you were hurt in the first place.”

Hector wracks out a snort that very nearly aches. “And how did you come to that dumb conclusion?”

“Well,” Eliwood starts, probing his attention to another wound, on Hector’s exposed upper arm - yes, Hector’s been sprawled beneath him shirtless all the while, trying not to let any of the misguided glee he feels at this flutter across his face. “You said yourself that you drew your axe to defend me against him. If I was only able to defend myself...then you wouldn’t be--”

“Don’t do this, Eli. You know I’ll snatch any opportunity to deck that guy.”

“But now the headmaster’s going to be intent on writing to Uther, and this will reflect poorly on both of you, not to mention Uther will be fuming when next you seem him.”

“Yeah, yeah, woe is me, I’ll have to sit through a little bit of chastising. Happens all the time. When have I ever not been able to take it?” Eliwood shuffles, grappling for Hector’s other arm, sponging his fistful of cloth against yet another nick from Erik’s sword. Pain licks up Hector’s arm in Eliwood’s wake. “Besides, when I tell Uther all the damage dumb Erik took, he’ll be glowing with pride. That’s a guarantee.”

Eliwood’s lips compress. “What other reason do you have to hate him, outside of me?”

“He’s stuffy. He’s an absolute prick. He has this way he wrinkles his nose sometimes, like he’s begging me to punch it. He’s boring. He actually  _ cares _ about arithmetic and all that. He’s a bastard to everyone who couldn’t obliterate him, not just you. Must I go on?”

“I’d much prefer you didn’t,” Eliwood says, flapping the hand he had been bracing against Hector’s chest a moment ago in a dismissal. “You’re right. I shouldn’t be so self-absorbed.”

“Oh gods, Eliwood, lay off yourself already. You’re not self-absorbed.”

Eliwood nibbles his lip. “You know, I rather enjoy arithmetic myself.”

“You would,” Hector grunts, then coughs on a chuckle. “But then, you’re not a bastard.”

“No, I’m just a helpless maiden who needs my chiseled best friend to hurl himself into duels every time my honor is threatened,” Eliwood says dryly, and Hector wishes Eliwood’s voice nursing this tone didn’t make his entire chest gasp with joy. 

“You’re not,” Hector says, pawing a hand through Eliwood’s hair just to watch that front strand collapse against his forehead. “Really. You’re not.”

“We both know I am. But it’s nothing for you to worry yourself over, Hector. It’s a fact: as long as I’m Eliwood and you’re Hector, I will always be the one needing rescued.”

And why that of all things crushes Hector’s heart in two, he doesn’t precisely know. 

So he ignores this; he manages another laugh, even if he has to strangle it out of himself. “Funny, how you can say something so ridiculous at the same moment you’re tending to my wounds and, um,  _ literally  _ rescuing me from my own foolishness on a daily basis.”

This manages to claw the corners of Eliwood’s lips into a smile. “So you’re finally willing to admit your foolishness?”

“I mean, I can’t exactly run from it forever,” Hector says. “Besides, I’ve got so much else going for me it hardly counts if I admit a singular flaw.”

“That’s fair,” Eliwood concurs, momentarily shrugging away from his work at Hector’s wounds to stab a glance over. Hector’s entire being crawls with that look. He’s infested with it, the way Eliwood studies him with all that worry and amusement intermingled in his eyes, every corner of himself cluttered with it - and all the feelings it so annoyingly dredges up. “You’re not actually quite as foolish as you seem, though. You’re not half the fool Erik is.”

And then he snickers, hunching over Hector again. The blood has finally grown bored of spraying to the surface; finally, Eliwood has put a stop to it, no healer needed. Of course he has.

“Yeah, at least I chose to fight using a weapon I could actually control,” Hector says. “Erik really needs to learn he’s not cut out for swordplay.”

“He’s much better with a lance, I’ve noticed,” Eliwood agrees.

“He’s at his best when he’s just keeping his damn mouth shut.”

“Oh, come now. He’s not the only one.” Hector dares a glance up at Eliwood, and receives a smirk and - wait for it - _a_ _telling_ _wink_ for his effort. 

“So you are a bastard after all,” Hector says, wonder braiding into his voice, as if he’s a child who’s just dusted off a particularly shiny stone. “I can’t believe we’re neck-deep in this friendship thing and you’re still so great at catching me off guard.”

“Someone has to be capable of doing it,” Eliwood says simply, then shoves himself to his feet. “If you’ll excuse me, I’m going to go smuggle some bandages, somehow. Wish me the best, and know that it’s because of your refusal to get properly healed that I must turn to this life as a thief and scoundrel. Oh, and for the sake of every god that exists,  _ stay put _ .”

And damn him, Eliwood strolls out of the room, back pulled up, straight and strong, leaving Hector alone in Eliwood’s quarters, jaw unstrapped by his shock and left to dangle until Eliwood returns to shock him yet again.


	2. two

Hector finds him dumped upon his back, staring down the stars with the weakest wisp of a challenge in his eyes, and all that Hector can think is:  _ this is my friend. _

Likewise, he flops down beside Eliwood, cushioning his head against the earth with his fingers woven loosely beneath his skull. Eliwood doesn’t so much as flicker a glance over at him, which leaves Hector with no choice but to scuff his foot against Eliwood’s leg until the friction sparks enough irritation in him to finally, at the very least, meet Hector’s eye.

“Thank you for coming along,” Eliwood says. His voice sounds strange, nearly muffled. Hector’s stomach wrenches, cowering away from that inevitable bubble of apprehension, because how can he not be apprehensive, when Eliwood sounds so beat? “Really. I can’t thank you enough. And if you’re only here due to our friendship making you feel obligated, I sincerely hope you understand...you don’t have to stay. I would never force you.”

_ Stuffy.  _ It’s the formal cut of his words - the way he trims all the emotion off before letting him pass the threshold of his throat - that has ants sprinkled throughout Hector’s gut.

“Come off it already,” Hector demands, a little too harsh. “You know I’m here because it’s been too long since I’ve been in a proper fight, and even longer since I’ve had a proper amount of time to enjoy you. Or, uh, enjoy your company. Anyway, it has nothing to do with debt, and it never will. You haven’t done  _ that  _ much for me.”

Eliwood chuckles. “Right.”

Silence chirps between them. Hector’s brimming with a strange anxiety he hasn’t felt since Eliwood’s fingers were spread across his chest, since he was oozing blood and Eliwood was playing the role of his nursemaid with soaring success.

“Eliwood.” The name kicks through Hector’s defenses far too easily. The nerves are quick to spill out afterward, constricting around his question: “What’s the matter?”

“Nothing. What do you mean?”

“I mean, you’re acting off, you’re being way too polite when you’re supposed to be polite to everyone except for me, you’re not treating me like your exception when that’s what I am and what I’ve always been, and you’re far too quiet for my taste. What’s.  _ Wrong _ ?”

“Ah, Hector. For as thick as you try to be, I tend to forget how you pick up on everything,” Eliwood says, still distant.

Hector speaks too quickly, each word trampling its predecessor to escape him. “That’s only with you, Eliwood. I really am stupid when it comes to everyone else.”

“But that’s not true. I think you know it isn’t true.”

“But it is.”  _ I couldn’t care less about anyone else. _

Eliwood’s eyes slide back toward him; Hector pins his own to the sky and tries not to be too aware of the way Eliwood’s gaze sears his skin. “Have you met Lyn yet?”

“The little twig of a girl from the plains of somewhere or somewhere else? Yeah, she introduced herself. And I introduced myself.”

“But have you met her? Have the two of you had a full-fledged conversation yet?”

“No. Why’s it so important?”

“Because the moment I met her, I...oh, what’s the harm? I’ll just say it: I looked directly into her eyes and couldn’t help thinking about you, Hector.”

His heart crashes into his stomach. “That sounds a little--”

“Don’t continue that sentence, if you intend to mock me with it.”

“I guess that means I’ll never finish my thought, then,” Hector says mournfully, and Eliwood rolls over to face him and squeezes his face into the tightest smile Hector’s ever suffered to see. “Hey, are you sure you’re okay?”

“Why wouldn’t I be?”

“I told you, it seems like you’re a bit off to me. Wait. You’re not sick, are you? I mean, gods know you have the most fragile health of just about anyone, ever.”

“That’s not it. As a matter of fact,  _ nothing _ ’s it. I am perfectly fine, Hector.”

“But you’re not,” counters Hector, voice unraveling, torn apart with anger he promises he’s trying to stuff back into his stomach, “and you’re lying to me, which makes it worse.”

“I…” And Eliwood’s voice is shaven down to the bare essentials too. His lip is thoroughly gnawed apart, Hector only realizes now. The bottom one, once full and glinting even in the lowest light, is jagged from where he’s chewed it up. Hector wants to trace the former glory of it with his thumb. He wants to, somehow, dash all the trouble that has rendered it down to this. 

“Eliwood. Just talk. Tell me whatever. Tell me  _ anything _ ,” and dear gods above, he’s pleading isn’t he? His hands might as well be clasped before him, fingers braided, lip wobbling. He might as well be misty-eyed, for all his subtlety.

Hector, begging. How has it come to this?

_ Oh, Eliwood, you’ve tarnished me. _

“I just...it’s really nothing. I’ve no idea what has you so concerned,” Eliwood says, slanting another smile over at him. 

“You’re quiet.”

“I’m always quiet.” He counters too quickly, or maybe Hector’s thundering heartbeat is somehow making the entire world whirl out of control.

“Yeah, but not to  _ me _ . To everyone except for me.”

“Hector. Ease up. Perhaps it’s you who’s  _ off _ , harrying me like this.”

“Eliwood, nobody stargazes unless they’re not okay.”

“Plenty of people stargaze. It’s cathartic - or cathartic, at least, until you joined me.”

“Come on, Eli, that’s mean.”

“Oh gods, it is, isn’t it? Apologies.”

“See, now you’re acting all formal again! What the hell is going on?”

Eliwood’s hand is roosting against his stomach, fingers fanned apart. Hector watches them bounce against his coat. “I’m perfectly fine. Just...slightly anxious. That’s all. Nothing to ruffle your feathers over, my friend.”

“Finally, we’re getting somewhere. Anxious, huh? What reason to do have to be--”

“Hector. Why don’t you take a moment to ponder that before you finish?” And there it is, that wryness, a talon flexing in his voice, tricking Hector’s heart into hammering.

“Okay, pondered it. What reason do you have to--”

“I abandoned my mother in Pherae, Hector,” Eliwood erupts, guilt scalding through his voice like fire gnawing through paper that never had a chance. “My poor mother, left all alone to toil with the business of a leader herself. It’s not that she’s incapable - no, she’s the strongest woman in the world, if I’ve the right to say so - but...she must be lonely, and that’s not fair.”

Hector spends a silent moment sucking on his lip, feeling a smorgasbord of warring emotions that translate ultimately to  _ terrible.  _ Eventually, he reclaims his tongue like a birthright: “Eliwood, your mother’s fine. She’s just excited to see you come home.”

“I don’t think she’ll be so excited if I return without my father in tow,” Eliwood counters, and he shoves himself into a sitting position, shooting his fingers through his hair. His knees curl inward, nestled against his chest, and he lets his head slump on top of them. “I don’t think I’m cut out for this grand quest,” he mumbles. “You are, but I’m not.”

“Eliwood.” Hector scrambles to sit beside him, twining an arm around Eliwood’s shoulders. “Anything I can do, you can do better. I know that for a fact.”

Eliwood gasps up for air, still cradling his knees close. His eyes slide to Hector’s, as they always have when they’re glittering like this, when his lips are nothing but a crease and a memory. “You seem to be forgetting just how weak I truly am.”

This tugs a snort out of Hector before he can contemplate whether or not amusement is appropriate at the moment. “You, weak? That’s like calling me smart.”

“You’re the smartest person I know.”

All Hector has to do is dish out a look so incredulous Eliwood chokes on a laugh.

“Okay, perhaps not the  _ smartest.  _ What I meant was...I’m as fragile as you are kind. And...sturdy. And beyond proficient at being a friend. Your timing is impeccable, by the way.”

“Eliwood, forget about me. Let this be about you.”

“We’d both prefer discussing your strengths than my weakness.”

“Speak for yourself. And load it on me, while you’re at it.”

“Well...I didn’t exactly prepare a speech. I was sincerely hoping we wouldn’t have to address this once throughout our little voyage,” Eliwood admits. “Besides, I’ve thrown enough at you already. I’ve expected more than enough of you, Hector.”

And maybe it’s the drunken stumble of the moon across the night sky, or the chant of each individual star wanting nothing but the best for them, but Hector’s hand is suddenly cupping Eliwood by the head, herding him closer. Eliwood lets himself be corralled against Hector’s shoulder, but, oddly enough, Hector doesn’t feel like  _ corralling  _ is what this is. 

Eliwood has not been coerced. Eliwood is pressed flush against him, sweltering, and are those nerves melting from his forehead or is that a fever, like the ones from their youth?

Perhaps it should stir some concern in him; in fact, it probably should. But Hector - Hector and the night trilling in his ears, and his heart painting bruises down his rib cage, and his mind dripping, begging to be molded anew into an effigy of Eliwood,  _ always _ Eliwood,  _ only _ Eliwood - can’t bring himself to let it matter.

“Eliwood. I want you to expect things from me. You can depend on me. And, gods, I didn’t mean to be an insensitive--”

“Hector.” If Eliwood is barging in on Hector’s heartfelt apology, he sounds so small and sweet while doing so it doesn’t even anger him. “Are you about to leech the tenderness from this moment with your foul mouth? If you were about to call yourself a revolting name, I would suggest never completing the sentence.” As he speaks, he burrows farther into Hector’s shoulder, blowing out a sigh.

Hector can’t fight his urge to knot his fingers through Eliwood’s hair. “You’re a pansy,” Hector tells him, then amends, “Actually, you might just be the toughest pansy out there.”

“Should I be touched?”

“Absolutely.”

“Then color me touched,” Eliwood declares, snaking his arms around Hector’s waist, and  _ is this really happening?  _ Because there’s no way this is really happening. “I can’t thank you enough, my friend, for being here. I feel a great deal better than I did. Admittedly, I’ve been shallow seconds away from losing my head since I departed Pherae, but even seeing your face settles me more than it probably should.”

“Oh, Eliwood,” Hector groans. “You’re so unfailingly kind to everyone but yourself. Sometimes your niceness annoys me, but it drives me crazy when you bottle things up like this. Believe it or not, you’re allowed to be a little weak now and then.”

“I’m weak constantly.”

“If you’re gonna bully yourself, then just shut up already.” His fingers tie tighter into Eliwood’s hair, and Eliwood squeaks. He eases up, but only slightly. “You should know at this point how not-weak you are. I can only reassure you so many times, you know.”

“I know.”

“Besides,” Hector battles on, because he’s dauntless tonight, “by the end of this, when we get your dad back to your mother safely, you’ll have no choice but to realize how brave and strong and fantastic and...well, brave you are. Because we’re gonna win this thing. I mean, you’ve got me, and you’ve got  _ you _ , so what else do you need?”

A moment of silence pulses between them, then: “You really should befriend Lyn,” Eliwood mumbles, voice hazy at the corners. “I’ve only had a few discussions with her, yet I can already tell that you two will get along splendidly.”

“We’ll see,” Hector grunts, then forgets it - the moon and Eliwood and Hector and Hector’s overwhelming  _ adoration  _ have all ballooned into something too whoppingly huge for the world to carry. There’s definitely not any room for that girl here tonight, not even in his head.


	3. three

He needs Eliwood.

He needs Eliwood Eliwood Eliwood Eliwood Eli--

He  _ needs _ .

Luckily, it’s never a problem, snatching Eliwood from Pherae. All Hector has to do is wedge in that word  _ catastrophe  _ somewhere within his letter and Eliwood is already dressing a horse for the occasion, apologizing profusely to Ninian and promptly leaving her behind.

And this time, there really  _ is  _ a catastrophe in Hector’s shaking hands.

When Eliwood drums his knuckles against their door the first time, both Hector and Lyn spring to their feet, but for very different reasons: Lyn, because Eliwood’s her dearest friend and she’s excited to babble out their news, and Hector, because Lyn cannot hear a word he shares with Eliwood about the reason he’s here.

He’s sworn to absolute secrecy; both of them are, unless Eliwood would like to witness a murder and Hector is itching to be a victim.

So then he’s hurtling towards the door, very nearly careening, nearly bashing the door out of his way with the brunt of his body, what small agility he has abandoned for speed. Lyn, meanwhile, vaults to answer the call of those echoing knuckles herself.

Hector, by some miracle, traps the door knob in his fingers first, wrenching it out of the way. “Hello,” Eliwood says, just as Hector flings the door shut behind him, clamps down on Eliwood’s wrist, and whisks him off to the stables neither himself nor Lyn have any use for. And technically, Lyn could still chase them in here, so Hector thrusts himself against the door, bracing it in its frame with the force of his entire weight.

He can’t help it; his breath shudders on its way out. Eliwood’s eyes are luminous with concern, a healthy dose of bemusement, and a swig of pleasure Hector would give anything to inhale; Eliwood seems pleased to be here and once again embroiled in Hector’s bullshit.

“Hello,” Eliwood attempts again, and Hector hasn’t the time for this, so he blusters on with the topic at hand that’s turning his pulse to a wail:

“Eliwood, I really messed up this time. Badly. Irreversibly. And I don’t know what to do.”

“Well, that’s not the cheery greeting I was hoping for,” Eliwood says, digging his hands through his hair. “What have you done this time?”

“I...I…” Hector’s chest pumps wildly. “I think I impregnated Lyn.”

Eliwood’s face scrunches around this information, only to bloom back into a grin. Gods, Hector can’t remember the last time he’s seen Eliwood so happy, and he doesn’t know why his heart still falters looking at him, and  _ this is wrong, whoops, this is so much worse than wrong.  _

“Hector!” Eliwood barrels forward, winding his arms around Hector without thinking about it. “That’s the greatest news I’ve heard in a long time. How long until…”

“Months. Not long enough.”

Worry leaks through Eliwood’s eyes. “What do you mean? You don’t sound as eager as you should be, to be having a child.”

“I mean...Eliwood, the kid itself is not the problem. It’s...well, I-I’m gonna be this kid’s father, and I don’t have all that much experience with fathers, having one or being one or, you know, being half-decent to children and not hating them for being bottomless pits of annoyances and extra work, and--”

At this point, he has Eliwood’s sleeves pinched between his fingers, his hands climbing up Eliwood’s arms until the fabric at the sleeves threatens to fray. Eliwood gently worms free.

“I never would have suspected you would be nervous about this,” he comments, and something roars to life just beneath Hector’s chest. 

“I’m not  _ nervous,  _ Eliwood. That’s not the problem. The problem is, I don’t have a clue what I’m doing and I’m slightly terrified that Lyn’s going to dice me up and feed me to Florina’s pegasus if I don’t get a grip on myself in the next few months.”

“Oh, you’re nervous,” Eliwood assures him. “But Hector...you’re going to be an excellent father. You could potentially be the greatest father possible to this child, in my opinion.”

A flush surges through Hector’s face. “Yeah, well, you have to say that, because I could crack you in two if I wanted to, with my bare hands. And because you’re just a good person.”

“It has nothing to do with either of those things, actually,” Eliwood says. “It has everything to do with the fact that you’ve been taking care of me since we were a pair of wide-eyed children, and you’ve been doing spectacularly with it. Not to mention how compassionate you are beneath all this,” and here, he flails his hands towards Hector as if to explain his point. “You may seem frightening on a superficial level, but you’re so very loyal to your friends. And you love Lyn with all your heart. What else does a father need to be?”

“I don’t know...experienced? Not clueless? Not afraid he’s going to squash his kid upon holding it for the first time?” he suggests.

Eliwood’s face jerks back with a wince. “Well, you’ll be perfect once you stop referring to your unborn child as an  _ it _ ,” he corrects himself, and Hector slaps a hand against his own face and lets it slide down to the beard that’s beginning to dot his chin. His lips purse.

“Gods, Eliwood, I’m not even acting like it’s a human,” Hector whines.

“Try again.”

“Wait. What’d I do wrong now?”

“You, uh...called the baby an  _ it  _ again,” Eliwood tells him, still grimacing, and Hector locks his hands into fists with the desire to punch something silly webbing through him instead of veins, but with no idea what to punch. 

Eventually, he lets his fists sag back to his sides, fingers unfurling right along with any hope he’d clung to that he could ever pull this off. “I can’t do this.” 

He can’t remember the last time he said anything even resembling that. His voice is threadbare, the layers of bravado peeled back to reveal the sniveling worry lurking beneath it all. 

Perhaps that worry has always been there.

His insides are crawling, his nerves corporeal, chewing a thousand of their own passages through him, crossing wherever they want to without a single thought for his sake. 

And he really can’t do this, but what he  _ can _ do is admit that again, so he does.

Eliwood, fingers twitching at his sides, creeps a few steps closer to Hector. His hands clap Hector’s biceps in a way that should be reassuring but instead startles a lump of something bitter into Hector’s throat. 

“Hector, you can,” is all he has to say. 

It’s not the words themselves that hollow Hector out, it’s the tone they carry with them, something about the ingenuity or possibly the conviction teeming within them. But all at once, the nerves are clipped of their legs, left to rot and die where they linger.

Not that they linger for long.

“You really think so?” Hector says, though he might as well be giggling outright. Even  _ that _ would be less humiliating than the way he nearly swoons on the question.

(And here, he remembers that he does indeed love Lyn,  _ he does _ , and the problem is his friendship with Eliwood towers leagues above just about any other love any other person has scribbled in their silly journals, and the love those people who never bothered to write it down thought ran deeper in them than anyone. There’s love rumpled in every corner of every room in the world, yet none of it can compare to the raw, necessary affection that’s coursing through him right now like a flood, like a plague setting out to destroy every last nook of him.

Does this mean he wants to leap the distance between them, risk everything he’s ever felt and everything he’s ever bothered to stow inside himself, and take a massive bite at Eliwood’s lips? Probably not. Hopefully not. He does love Lyn, after all.)

“Why else would I say it, if I didn’t believe it with every inch of myself?” Eliwood replies. His fingers are still sunken into Hector’s arms. “I promise, you can do it. You’ve faced a thousand challenges before, my friend, and succeeded every time. Don’t let this be any different. Well, you can afford to approach this one a bit more gingerly, but besides that. You’re the same unstoppable Hector as before. You will always be unstoppable.”

And Hector’s heart may have just swallowed itself, because suddenly all he’s aware of is the air floating through his chest, knocking his lungs without satiating them, and his heart has poofed into nothing. Surprised into silence.

He’s going to die, he realizes, all because of that word  _ unstoppable  _ curling off of Eliwood’s tongue like a breeze on the seaside, like petals framing the most treasured bud, like a dagger puncturing his stomach, leaving him frozen silent save for the sound of his gut crumpling into itself.

Of course, he’s  _ not _ going to die, and his heart  _ hasn’t _ vanished. No, he fears that it’s tripled in size instead.

“You know what?” Hector decides. “You’re right. I am pretty unstoppable.”

“I’m glad to hear you saying it again,” Eliwood says, a soft smile thawing on his face, but he stops short - then smirks. “I never thought I’d welcome back your boasting like that.”

“You love it. Just like everything else about me.”

“I do,” Eliwood says, and Hector is just about shoved on his knees just to hear it.


	4. four

Hector has known Eliwood for years. Cringingly cliche as it may be, he’s spent countless nights tallying down the amount of freckles that dust his nose, wondering which of the gods swooped down and peppered all those kisses across his face. He’s seen Eliwood’s front swamped with blood - he’s seen fear, sparked like flint in those blue eyes he’s waded through but never had the guts to swim. He’s seen Eliwood glowing with hope, glowing with rage, glowing with fever.

But never, in all these years he’s spent scrawling every word Eliwood says and every tic of his face, has Hector seen him quite so frenzied as he is right now.

Ninian has been snoozing below ground for two days now, probably freezing in her coffin, too boundless a dark space for her to fill. Two days.

And still, here Eliwood is, chin jutted out with a defiance he’s prone to tucking away (but gods, when he wears it, he wears it well), and he continues refusing to cry.

He meets them at the door, Roy slung under his arm. The child, barely three, burbles with grief they all know he’s proclaimed to the heavens with his screeching, but at the moment, he’s quiet. Hector doubts that will last for long.

“Hector, Lyn, Lilina, hello,” Eliwood says, almost panting. “Yes, hello. N-Nice to see you all - especially you, Lyn. Roy’s been begging me to let him see his favorite aunt.” When he rumples Roy’s hair with his fingers, Hector can nearly ignore how stiff the jut of his jaw is. 

_ Nearly _ , but not quite: there’s stress threaded into every muscle in Eliwood’s neck, in the quiver that Hector bets has taken residence in his hands since the funeral. In the knit of his brows, tugged too close, hunched too low. In the mute of his eyes.

Hector wants nothing more than to skate a thumb down Eliwood’s cheek, to rub the tension from his jaw, to lean far too close and, only by chance--

No. Eliwood has been widowed for two days, and Hector’s wife is standing literally right there at his shoulder, and already his mind is scampering in all the wrong directions, and he can’t do this. Not today.

Instead, he scoops Lilina up with one hand just for an excuse to snip his eyes away from Eliwood, letting her pound her flimsy little hands against his chest, cuddling closer than anyone else has ever tried to. “I wanna go play with Roy,” she mutters, and Hector grins. 

“If you really wanna leave your old man behind,” he says, and Lilina smacks her hands against either side of his face, giggling, “then go on already. Don’t let us stop you.”

“I won’t!” Lilina says, then writhes out of his arms, shivering with excitement. “Come on, Roy, let’s go play battle! I’ll go get you a sword!”

_ That’s my girl. _

Lyn seems slightly more concerned than Hector can bring himself to feel. “Maybe those two need some supervision after all,” she comments, watching them chase each other to the open field behind the residence of the marquess and his son, already squabbling. It’s like Roy’s sadness has been scrubbed away, forgotten. “Last thing we want is for them to pick up a real sword. I’ll, uh, keep an eye on them,” she says, then swings her lips to Hector’s ear, lilting onto her toes. “And you take care of Eli. I obviously can’t.”

And what makes her think Hector can handle it? She’s always believed in him far too much; her and Eliwood really are quite similar, in that regard.

Stitching his lips against a doozy of a sigh, Hector waves her off - and Eliwood immediately cracks his hand down on Hector’s wrist, clutching as firmly as he can when his fingers are shaking like mad. 

“Uh--” Hector chokes, too slow, because Eliwood is already tearing back into the castle.

“We need to spar,” Eliwood informs him. “Did you know that? We haven’t sparred in three months, Hec. Normally, we spar every two. Why’s that?”

“Because we’ve got kids, remember? And, uh, titles?”

“Well, yeah, but all that aside...we still have to get this done every two months. But we didn’t - we didn’t do it last month. It’s eating me up, you know. We had a duty to each other, and we betrayed it, Hec. We’re traitors.”

“Shame on us,” Hector jokes along - he hopes against hope that Eliwood is joking, anyway. “Gods rest our souls, for we hath sinned.”

“My thoughts exactly. We have to do this. We have to repent.” By this point, he’s crashed into the armory. He whisks a sword up from the carefully organized shelves, and hefts up an axe for Hector, stumbling beneath the weight of it. Eliwood has never been suited for axes, least of all now, with his muscles drained by grief and--

And perhaps something else.

Hector has seen Eliwood in mourning before: he’s seen him fold beneath it, crumble and fling himself into his duties with an empty sort of vengeance and lend his entire self to it. He’s heard Eliwood resound into broken silence beneath it.

He’s seen Eliwood crushed.

But never has he seen Eliwood  _ manic. _

And Hector is not a man who cowers - hell, he’s rarely a man who cares enough to let fear slink in deep enough to register. But here he is, steeling himself to fight off the sudden tremble scrabbling up his spine at the flash of Eliwood’s eyes on him.

“Wait. We can’t spar in here. Don’t wanna break anything,” Eliwood says, and that’s another thing: his sentences seem to be chipping in his throat, filed down to the bare necessities. Hearing this from a man who could sew rows upon rows of words so seamlessly not even a week ago has Hector’s stomach leaping.

Of course, the fact that the man in the question is Hector’s greatest friend - the only person he could ever, ever love more than the pair of ladies just outside - makes this even worse, impossibly worse.

“Eliwood, are you sure we should be--”

“Yes, Hector, I’m sure,” Eliwood more-or-less growls. “Positive. Should we go outside? I’m thinking we can send the children and Lyn in here, and then we’ll have the meadow all to ourselves. Sound good, Hec?”

“Look, we both know there’s a serious problem when I’m the one with my head screwed on right,” Hector says, and Eliwood’s eyes dance somewhere behind Hector’s back, fading right through him. “Eliwood, I honestly don’t think you should be holding a weapon right now.”

“Then what the hell should I be doing?”

Hector’s tongue clogs his throat. He has  _ nothing  _ to say, and no reason to try.

“Heh, yeah, that’s what I’m thinking. Let’s spar. Let’s spar.”

“Heard you the first time,” Hector says, voice scratched with the sort of agitation that should slap Eliwood across the face, spook remorse into his eyes. This, at least, doesn’t change. “I’m still obviously not moved, Eli. Come on.”

“Hector, w-we’ve been doing this since we were boys,” as if Hector needs reminded. “Hector, we have to keep doing it. I can’t lose it. I can’t…”

Eliwood’s shoulders cave, his lips drilling together until they disappear. 

“I  _ can’t _ .”

“Eliwood--”

“Hector, she’s dead.”

Eliwood’s final word crunches to nothing, and it hurts to hear. Something inside Hector is smashed to splinters. This something seems to be located in his chest. And Hector can’t speak; he very well might never be able to speak again.

“And gods, what if I didn’t love her enough?”

This time, the words wash over Hector in a naked, shivering rasp, a gust of the sorriest wind in the world. Hector’s eyes are searing.

Still, he manages to claw up a snort, even if his throat bleeds beneath it. “Eliwood, if anything, you loved her way too much. Watching you two was nauseating for the rest of us, you know. And she...she loved you just as much as you loved her. It was kind of disgusting.”

Eliwood’s eyes veer to the floor. “Hector, you don’t…”

Hector’s heart seizes. “I don’t what, Eliwood?”

“I just don’t know if I loved her enough.”

“And I just told you to stop worrying about that! It’s stupid, Eli. You love stronger than probably anyone else, ever, in the entire world. Leave this be.”

“I can’t. I wish we were sparring,” Eliwood croaks, and when his eyes scale back to Hector’s, he expects them to be pooling with tears. They aren’t. “Can’t we? Please?”

“No way. You can’t do this right now.”

“Have to. I’ll die if I don’t.”

“You’ll die if we do. I’ll impale you on accident or something, and you’ll be too dizzy with all this grief you’re trying not to feel that you won’t be able to dodge me.”

“You won’t impale me.”

“Fine. Gut you then. We both know I get wild in the thick of it, Eliwood. I don’t trust either of us with this right now. But the second you’re up for it, we’ll go. We’ll spar, kid. And I will let you win, dammit.” Hector’s voice frays at the edges, brimming with all of Eliwood’s sadness stacked atop his own. “And it won’t matter if that means I lose.”

A thrum of silence, buzzing through Hector like a bite of icy air. He persists.

“Eliwood, won’t you just make this easier for both of us and just admit that you’re not okay? And then I’ll help you out of this room full of sharp things that could kill you when you’re not aware enough of them, and we can...ugh. We can hash it out.”

Eliwood’s eyes comb the air around Hector, barely bumping against him, and scrambling away when they do. “There’s nothing to discuss.”

“There obviously is. Now, you should be smart enough to figure out I’m not dropping this until I get something of substance out of you about it, okay? I mean, your wife - the mother of your child - is dead and buried. There’s no way you’re just ready to--”

He cuts himself off when Eliwood’s cheeks flare.

And  _ oh gods,  _ is he  _ really  _ the insufferable asshole who just tossed the death of his wife into his grieving best friend’s face?

“Thanks for that reminder, Hector. I’d forgotten,” Eliwood mumbles.

So he  _ is  _ that insufferable asshole.

“Shit. Shit, Eli, I’m sorry.”

“I know you are. It’s okay, Hector. It’s fine.”

“Actually, it’s not. And it doesn’t have to be! Just...get mad at me. Raise hell. Spar the shit out of me, Eli - you can win. Do it here. Do whatever you want. Shut me up, because I shouldn’t have said that, because you know your wife is dead, and I...I’m somehow making it worse again, aren’t I? This is what I mean. Slay me here and now, Eliwood. You’ve the right.”

He’s so busy rambling through these apologies that can’t patch up Eliwood’s wounds, no matter how much sincerity soils them, that he doesn’t know Eliwood is only inches away from him…

Until familiar, spindly fingers graze either side of his face.

Hector, stomach curdled, heart pried straight from his chest, prods his eyes slowly down to Eliwood’s, which snag his without an ember of their fire from before.

“It’s okay. You can’t change it, Hector. None of us can. And...And it’s true, isn’t it? Ninian is dead, whether or not she was...the only girl I ever...Hector. You’re allowed to say it.”

“And you’re allowed to shove a sword through my gut for saying it to your face.”

Eliwood drifts closer, mouth a slit, ajar and inviting. 

_ No. Not  _ inviting _. Who the hell do you think you are, Hector?  _

Eliwood’s nose, tickling Hector’s throat, as if trying to snuggle deeper into the valley between Hector’s collarbones. Then, not his nose: a stamp, a flush of warmth.

A kiss.

Hector’s entire body jolts, then slumps, every muscle soothed by the warmth swirling through him. Every nerve ending, snuffed. 

Every thought that should be protesting, that he sort of  _ wishes  _ was protesting, ebbs into a silence so pleased he wants to shred his own mind.

Eliwood plants another kiss into that lone hole of Hector, that single, parched pit just begging to be quenched by something, preferably warm, preferably sweet. Then, Eliwood melts into Hector’s chest as the spot his lips just stirred to life simmers.

“Eliwood…”

All the sharp edges have been trimmed from his voice when he answers Hector’s call: “See, this is why I’m afraid I didn’t love her enough.”

“Why?” 

“Because when I woke up beside her,” Eliwood fumbles, so quiet Hector’s ears strain to hear, “sometimes a part of me hoped it was you on the other side of the bed.”

And Hector - idiot that he is, idiot he’s aptly proven himself to be a million times in just the last ten minutes - can’t scrape together the effort to bead a sentence together. 

Eliwood blunders on, every bit as unstoppable as he’s convinced himself Hector is. “I know I loved her, Hector. I don’t think I could have hidden it away if I didn’t. I would’ve never let her bear my child if I...if I didn’t...I could never. But I’m afraid she’s not the only one I loved.”

Something in Hector blares, the soulless ringing in his ears molding into words he’s pretty sure he’s been fleeing from for years:  _ me too, me too, me too. _

“Me too, Eliwood,” he confesses, carding a hand through the hair he may or may not have been in love for this entire time, “me too, me too.”

This yanks a sharp breath into Eliwood’s throat. It’s a dainty sound, one Hector would love nothing more than to smuggle into his pocket to cradle in the privacy of his own home like a swindled gemstone. “You know,” Eliwood mumbles, “this has to be the end of it. We can’t…”

“I know,” Hector says, but it’s not even close to what he wants to say.

_ But can’t we? _


	5. five

When Hector ducks into the home that belongs to the better chunk of his soul, heartbreak reeks in his nose, flooding his chest and crusting around his lungs, trying to choke him up. It succeeds more than Hector would ever admit.

Roy scrambles out of Eliwood’s bedroom, looking too eager to leave his father behind and too young for Hector’s chest to prickle with rage at that fact. His eyes are wide, blue,  _ eternal  _ in the way Hector’d always told himself Eliwood’s were. There’s so much of Eliwood spangled across this little hero’s face, it hammers an ache to life between Hector’s eyes.

“Finally,” Roy says, wrangling his lips up into a smile that seems to slice Hector in half. “He’s been telling me how much he wishes you were here for hours. He’s, uh...been asking for my mother too, but obviously, she can’t exactly drop by to visit. Thanks, by the way.”

“For what? Being here for the only best friend I’m ever gonna have?”

“Well...yes.”

“There’s nowhere else I want to be, Roy,” Hector says, all the gruffness he’d intended brushed from his voice, until only the gentle rustle of truth remains. This affection he didn’t mean to let on so strong sucks at his ankles now, and he kind of has to please it, doesn’t he? 

He pets Roy’s hair, so much like Eliwood’s. 

“Nowhere in the world,” he hears himself admit, and Roy’s smile slackens into something far more honest than the contortion of lips he’d offered before. Apparently, Roy has inherited his lack of ability to mask the truth from the so-called  _ uncle _ that smiles down on him right this second; there’s nothing of his father in the way he flounders to bury the grief dismantling his face now. “Why don’t you run along, huh?”

“I’m not a child anymore, Uncle, sir,” Roy points out. “If my father’s dying, I’d at least like to be there for him as he weathers away. Please don’t shoo me off.”

Hector’s lips jam together, a crease of sadness more than one of veiled surprise. _Of_ _course_ Roy is this mature about it, but it gnaws at just about everything inside Hector, chipping away at him, that this little boy has to be.

“Just give me a second alone, won’t you? I’ll let you join me when I’m ready for you. Sound good?”

“Sounds...bearable,” Roy allows, and Hector dabs a far-too-gentle kiss into the nest of Roy’s hair before shoving past him to join Eliwood, heart a splinter in his wind pipe.

When he bows into the room, everything in his stomach jumbles. Gods, he wasn’t ready for this, he wasn’t ready, he will never be ready--

To see Eliwood shriveled into himself on the bed, knees curled into his chest beneath the sheet, shivering despite the flush that pollutes his face in smudges. He’s panting through driving jaws just to breathe, halfway wheezing, sicker than Hector has ever seen him before.

And Hector realizes it’s hardly his heart perched inside his throat. No, that’s a bundle of tears. 

Those tears are already streaming down his face as he clenches his mouth into a smile and smacks Eliwood’s hair off from his forehead, where it’s bound down by the fever.

“I’ve been hoping to see you,” Eliwood croaks. “Hello. Is there a reason you’re crying? That’s hardly like you, my friend.”

“It’s hardly like you to just keel over and die,” Hector grinds out, trying so hard to crush this infernal sob before it escapes. “You’ve got a kid. You’re not allowed to do this.”

“You really think I intend to die?” Eliwood asks, nose crinkling, as if this is something to laugh about. “When I have a son still growing? That’s not what’s happening here, Hector. I’ve spent half my life bedridden. This has no reason to be different than all those other days and weeks I’ve wasted.” As he speaks, he fumbles for Hector’s hand, flossing his weak fingers through much stronger ones, which grip his as if Eliwood’s will just crumble to sand and sift straight through the cracks. And they  _ might.  _ Hector’s not crazy to be afraid of that.

“I don’t believe you,” Hector spits.

“You could be more pleasant than that,” tuts Eliwood, swinging their clumsily-knotted fingers as cheerfully as he possibly can.

“I’ve never been pleasant.”

“I know. I’ve always adored that about you, Hector. At school, the rest of us busied ourselves with being charismatic and...and poised, and perfect. But you were never one for playing roles. I wish we were all so courageous.”

“It’s a gift,” Hector stammers, another tide of tears teetering from his eyelids, plummeting down his face without a second thought for themselves. He tries to bat them away, but they keep on coming, the bastards. “Eliwood, are you trying to say you’re not brave?”

“Not as brave as you, certainly,” he rasps.

“My gods, you’re an idiot, then. You’re the pluckiest guy there ever was.”

“Hector, I told you, this isn’t death. I am not dying. Thus, you don’t have to feed me falsehoods just so I can die at peace with myself.”

“When have I ever fed you falsehoods? If you were a damn coward, I’d tell you so.”

“Well, you certainly told Erik so,” Eliwood says, the corners of his mouth flitting at the corners. Said corners are clotted with saliva, but it’d be impolite to say as much, wouldn’t it? So Hector refrains. Even if he’s never been concerned with courtesy before, there has to be a first time for everything. “So I suppose I can believe that.”

“Oh, shit. I never asked how you were feeling,” Hector thinks aloud, then shakes his head and pins his eyes back to Eliwood’s, even if that point of contact between them makes the air itself throb. “How are you feeling?”

Eliwood’s chin trembles. “I’m fine,” he says. “Great, actually. I should be positively fit, come morning.”

“And you say I’m the one spouting falsehoods,” Hector grumbles.

“What was that?”

“I said, you’re lying to me.”

“I’m perfectly alright,” Eliwood vows, then shimmies up against his pillows as if that’s somehow proof enough. Just as soon as he’s sitting up, his back collapses, snapping him back into a slump, chest back to rattling with the effort it takes to breathe. “Just...shaky.”

“Eliwood, must I remind you that you’re stewing in your own damn body heat?”

“Fevers pass. I wouldn’t be feverish if my body wasn’t battling this, besides.”

“If I were the one sick like that, you’d be nailing me to the bed.”

“Good thing you’re not the ill one, then,” Eliwood comments, but the words are just puffs of useless air at this point. His face flashes pale, and Hector is lurching forward, with no idea what to do, because it looks to him like Eliwood is ready to black out, and that  _ cannot  _ happen, but what does Hector know about saving his life?

What the hell does Hector know about anything at all?

“Eliwood, you moron, don’t leave me,” Hector says, bracing him by the shoulders. “Don’t you dare, Eliwood, you’re not dying without me, you’re not leaving me  _ behind _ \--”

That pops Eliwood’s eyes open again. Blood dribbles down his chin; he must have nipped his tongue while nearly flickering out. His lips gape apart. “I have a son, Hector,” he hisses. “I’m not going to die.”

“And just how do you figure?” Hector asks, still looming on his feet.

“Because my boy will not live the rest of his youth an orphan.”

“You don’t get to decide that, Eliwood.”

“Well, I simply feel that it’s unjust is all, to snatch me away from my son so soon. Unjust things don’t happen to people who fight in the name of justice.”

“What are you talking about?” Hector scrapes his teeth together and hopes desperately that this isn’t some sort of fever-baked hallucination. “Please tell me this isn’t about gods and their shit.”

“It has nothing to do with gods. I don’t need to believe in them, Hector; I believe in people. I believe we each forge our own fate, and I believe that the fate I drew out for myself is one deserving of mercy. That’s all.”

“Eliwood, that doesn’t even make--”

“I know it doesn’t make sense,” Eliwood mumbles, words bleeding together. “But I need something to place some faith in. And I have always placed my faith in what’s right.”

“Find something else to have faith in. Something that actually cares about Roy.”

“Fine. Then I believe in you.”

Silence buzzes between them, charged by the crackle of shock in Hector’s head. “What? Eli, I don’t know if I can help you now.”

“Perhaps you can’t heal me. But you can give my son a home. And you can keep him safe.” Hector’s head quirks to the side at that.

“What do you mean? He’s plenty safe.”

“There’s something...something kindling inside of me, Hector, and it’s making me think that maybe none of us are safe. Do you ever get those terrible gut feelings?”

“No, but...you know what? I’ll keep that in my mind. Except…”

“What?” Eliwood gasps.

Hector only realizes now he’s been nursing Eliwood’s face between his hands for far too long to be acceptable. Still, he clings to it, thumbs gliding across the skin, trying to smother out the flames of the fever, and trying to sculpt the way it feels into his memory, just in case.

“I thought you said you weren’t going to die.”

“I’m...not. I’m certainly not planning to. But it’s rational to be prepared for the worst.”

“Forget rational. Eli, I obviously can’t bother with rational right now, and I’m not the one keeling in bed.”

“You’re never rational. I am. That’s how it is. See? Normal. Typical. I’m fine, Hector, the same as I ever was,” Eliwood falters, tripping over the first word and crawling through the rest of them. And he’s lying, but Hector’s already risking his third rush of tears, and he honestly can’t clump the energy together to call him out on this, and he doesn’t want to anymore.

Hector boards against the sadness churning in his stomach, sliding the pad of his thumb across the trail of Eliwood’s freckles marching across his skin like schoolchildren in line. “Eli,” he says, and that’s all he can force out before Eliwood sucks in a sudden breath. “What is it?” Hector asks, dread stacking up in his chest. “Gods, you’re not going to--”

“Hector,” Eliwood says, “I...I haven’t...I haven’t spoken to Mark in years.”

“Who the hell is Mark?”

“ _ Mark _ , Hector. Lyn’s friend. The tactician.”

“Oh.  _ Him _ .” Hector feels himself sneering. “He was far too fond of Lyn for my liking. He must’ve known he had no chance when it was me she loved the whole while, right?”

“That’s not important,” Eliwood says. Color swims through his cheeks. “What if I do die, Hector? And what if he’s alive out there, just waiting for me to express how grateful to him I am, and...and what if he’s forgotten me entirely?”

“Eliwood. No one who’s ever seen you could forget you.”

Eliwood seems to fade against his pillow. “I’m not quite so confident about that. I’m feeling pretty forgettable at the moment.” As he nears the end of the obviously ridiculous comment, his voice creaks, rusty, then breaks, a door ripped from its hinges. He smashes his arm over his face, swinging it in a wild arc to get it there in time, then coughs. Hard. His entire body seems to writhe, and that’s when it hits Hector, a smack to the face, branding his cheeks with a burning-red rendition of the truth:  _ Eliwood, the damn traitor, really is dying. _

“You’re not,” Hector argues, but is he addressing Eliwood or the sting in his own head? Not even he knows. 

Slowly, Eliwood lifts his arm off his own face, draping it across his stomach instead, wincing slightly. He makes a sound like grumbling, then coughs again, lips sealed against it. At this point, his grimace wrinkles his entire face, and he’s been bad, but never  _ this  _ bad. No illness has ever aged this ageless saint of a man until now.

And fine, maybe Hector’s cheeks are drowning in their third shower of the day, but it’s alright, it’s alright. He’s alright.

It’s Eliwood whose face is still dry.

“Hector, I really, really need to see him. Mark, I mean. I’m terrified that he’s forgotten how thankful I am. C-Can you please...would you mind…”

“Can’t,” Hector says, the single word exploding like a bitter bomb in his throat. “Eliwood, I’m leaving again tomorrow. Shit of the Lycian League variety. Bern, remember?”

“I should help too. Lycia’s as much my home as it is yours, Hector. I should go with you.” And the words are turned to jokes by the raw,  _ sick _ twist of Eliwood’s waning voice, so Hector ignores them. If he has to murmur to speak, then there’s no way his presence on the battlefield would possibly be of help.

Hector weaves his fingers into Eliwood’s hair now. “Even if you somehow rebound from this, Eli, I have my doubts you’ll ever see a battlefield again. Maybe before I head out tomorrow I can make Lyn write to Mark or something, if you want to see that guy so badly. Whatever you want, I can arrange for it.”

Eliwood’s lips pinch into a smile. “You’re a much better friend than you tend to believe, Hector.” His smile swells into what might be a grin, dim at the edges, just like his eyes; it’s like, even as Eliwood’s soul pummels on, his body is already giving him up.

And that’s bullshit. It’s absolute bullshit _. _

“Don’t be so despondent, Hector. You are. You’re the greatest friend.  _ My Hector _ ,” Eliwood fawns, raising powerless hands to cup Hector’s face. “May I call you that?”

Hector feels his face scorching to a pulp. “Sure thing, as long as Lyn doesn’t hear you.”

“I don’t mean it that way,” Eliwood chides him, trying to laugh but shuddering instead. “I would never try to take you from her. The two of you were absolutely made for each other, even if there are days I may wish that wasn’t the case.” 

“Huh?” Hector says, eyes suddenly too snug in their sockets. 

Eliwood’s mouth twitches, as if he’s trying to smirk but he can’t quite pull it off. “There are days, even more commonplace now that Ninian’s not here, chasing away these thoughts with her beautiful smile...days that I start thinking I may have been in love with you since that very first spar.”

“I beat you that day, remember?”

“Of course I do. I didn’t mind losing to such a strong opponent.”

“Eliwood, we were six. I was twice your size. You never stood a chance.”

“I remember that, too, don’t worry.” Eliwood chuckles, or wheezes, or huffs. “But really, Hector. I think there’s a part of me that’s always belonged to you since then. A part that was willing to lose with courtesy, if it meant spending another afternoon with you. A part that’s wanted you to be mine as much as I am yours.”

Hector’s heart hiccups out of rhythm, his lungs crumpling, everything inside of him scraped empty of everything, save for an emotion that’s always been there, foaming in his throat, splashing his feet - an emotion he’s pretty confident to scribble down as  _ love  _ now. 

“Eliwood...I really don’t think you would’ve ever taken Ninian’s hand if...if that were…” Uncertainty doesn’t suit him; it chews through his words, makes them sound skewed off the beat, nearly drunken in their stagger, and it makes him sound like a man who’s only half of him. A man with withered hands, minced courage. Someone he might be ashamed of, honestly, but he can’t really focus hard enough to feel anything but this nauseating love right now.

“I know. I...really, really hope I wouldn’t have, had this been the way I felt all along. Yet, I’m so sure that’s what this is. This is love, Hector. My Hector,” he says again, keen and kind, halfway swooning, eyelids propped low over his eyes.

Hector can’t decide whether Eliwood is just exhausted and loopy with it, or if he means every face and every word. Somehow, both of these options blend fear in with whatever the hell else is at war inside of him.

“Eliwood, perhaps you should get some shut eye, okay?”

“I suppose,” Eliwood relents, which makes Hector’s head whine with a warning:  _ this is not like him, this is not like him, there is something wrong, something terribly wrong.  _ “But make sure I’m awake when Mark arrives. Oh, and why don’t you bring Roy home with you? He’ll be considerably happier in the home of his favorite aunt and uncle, along with his best friend. Much better off than staying with his wreck of a father.”

“You’re not a wreck,” Hector says, temper stoked. “Don’t you dare say that about yourself. You’re always so damn mean, you know that? You’re terrible, and you deserve to be punched for that, because no one talks to my Eliwood that way. Not even him. Besides, I can’t leave you alone here.”

“And I can’t bear forcing Roy to play my nurse. Please, take him with you.”

“We’ll see. Now...just rest already, won’t you?”

“Fine, fine, I will. But before I do, I have pressing business to attend to.” He shuffles up against his pillow again - Hector’s hands slam his shoulders, ready to force him down - and Eliwood slings his arms over Hector’s shoulders and kisses him, and Hector - well, gods, Hector shouldn’t be letting him - Hector shouldn’t be stenciling his tongue across Eliwood’s mouth just so he’ll remember it, once Eliwood is dead - and Hector is not a widow, not like Eliwood, he has no  _ right  _ \- but Lyn would forgive him, dammit, she’d understand, so stop thinking about it, start savoring - this is the first and last time you get to be so utterly  _ near _ him, lapping up his heat. 

Salt laces Eliwood’s lips.

And Lyn would forgive Hector for this.

It lasts until Eliwood dips out of it to cough, folding into himself to do so; if the flecks of moisture that adorn Eliwood’s beautiful chin are dyed pink with blood, Hector pretends so hard not to notice that he can forget it, for now, but only for now, as he flicks the mess away with the softest brush of his thumb. You could even call it a caress.

Eliwood slouches back into his pillow. “It seems my work is done,” he says, each word swirled into the last by drowsiness. “I just...couldn’t die without doing that. Once. That’s it. D-Don’t tell Lyn.” He stifles a sob, but it barely makes a difference, and Hector’s heart splinters apart. “Please don’t tell her. I...I’m so sorry.”

“It can be our secret, Eliwood. Whatever you want.” The wince has returned, gripping Eliwood with every bit of force he can’t combat. “What’s wrong?”

“Hector...I’m sorry. I’m sorry.”

“For what? Come on, Eli, stop apologizing already. I kissed you back, didn’t I?”

“Not about that. About leaving you behind.”

“You haven’t left me yet, and you won’t. You’re too decent to desert me.”

“But death...sickness...none of that is decent enough to take my wishes into account. I’m sorry.”

“How can you be so sure?” 

“This feels different. I’ve never...never once felt this ghastly before.”

Hector’s eyes prick again. “Sleep it off, kid,” he demands, ruffling a hand through Eliwood’s hair. “I’m keeping Roy here, by the way. You need someone here, someone who can handle it - and that boy can do more for you than I could, that’s for sure. If there’s trouble with the mission, I’ll send for you, if you’re up to walking. Which you will be. Because you’re not going to die. Because you’re just not allowed to.”

Eliwood squeezes on a smile through the tears caked upon his cheeks, plastered in place by the fever. “I’ll do my best,” he says through a yawn, then, at long last, nuzzles back against the mattress. “I’ll do my best,” he echoes, even quieter, and he looks like a skeleton beneath the blanket, every bone its own insurmountable mountain, and Hector can’t bear it, so he creeps out of the room on tiptoe just as Eliwood lapses into sleep.

Of course, there’s Roy hovering outside the door. “Is he alright? Should...Should I…?”

Hector flaps a hand, and Roy breaks off. “Let him sleep for a bit,” Hector says - then softens, corners melting away. “Make sure you take good care of him, Roy. Your father is...he’s someone precious. Keep an eye on him - he’ll do the fighting himself. Your old man’s a fighter before just about everything, after all, boy. Stronger than all of us.”

He can feel Roy’s eyes stalking after him as he strides toward the door, but he doesn’t let that stop him on his trek - because it feels like a trek, an odyssey. A vacuum, jaws unhinged, waits to gulp him down when he gets over there to the door. Leaving Eliwood behind, in a way, is like leaving himself here, in the house of the man he’s probably loved all this time, rotting right beside Eliwood in that ghostly cold bed.

Still, that can’t stop Hector from leaving.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey, you finished my fic!!! Thank you so, so much for reading it :D


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